New privacy laws passed by the New South Wales government are proving to be serious barriers to chaplains working in the state's overburdened health system.

The Health Records and Information Privacy Act (2002) now requires patients to request a visit from a chaplain before they can receive the sort of social and spiritual support hospital-goers have benefited from for decades.

The Privacy Act, which came in force in September, has drastically reduced the number of people chaplains can visit.

The Rev David Lloyd, the Anglican chaplain at St. Vincents Hospital, Darlinghurst, says in just over six weeks the act has slashed the number of patients he can visit by two-thirds.

The Act states that "" a patient must give consent before being visited by a representative of a religious group where that representative is not employed by the hospital.'

"We can't easily do our job because we don't have access to patient records," Mr Lloyd said.

Mr Lloyd says chaplain visits now hinge on how patients answer the question, "Would you like to receive a visit from a representative of a religious group?'

The Anglican chaplain is highly critical of the way the question is phrased, describing it as equally likely to describe a cult as an established denomination.

"Many Christians would say "no' to that question " it has all the wrong connotations," Mr Lloyd said.

He says the end result is that a large number of people who would like to receive a visit from a denominational chaplain now pass through the system without any contact whatsoever.